Voicemail 6:16 — A Disturbing True Horror Story About Time Loops, Identity, and Death

 What would you do if you started getting voicemails from yourself—each one arriving at exactly 6:16 AM? 

In this chilling true-style horror tale, Claire begins receiving terrifying voice messages. Each one is from a version of herself. Each one warns her not to do something. But as the messages become darker and more desperate, Claire realizes they might not be warnings… they might be traps. 

From the mirrors in her home to the voice behind her door, something is watching her. Something is using her voice. And something doesn’t want her to escape the loop. 

Voicemail 6:16 is an immersive, 17-minute psychological horror story filled with paranoia, identity collapse, time distortion, and one impossible question: 

If you heard your own death… would you answer the call? 

— 

🎧 Best enjoyed with headphones.
 🕓 Runtime: ~18 minutes
 🔁 New episodes weekly. 

✉️ Send listener horror stories: blightynightmares@gmail.com
 📍 Follow us on TikTok / YouTube: @blightynightmares

Transcript

“This is going to sound insane. I know it does. But I’m leaving this recording in case it happens to someone else. Or in case… I don’t make it through the next week.”

“Every morning at 6:16 AM, I get a voicemail. Always from the same number. Always from the same voice. Mine.”

“The message is always different. But it always ends the same way—begging me not to do something.”

“And the last message…”

“…was me dying.”

My name is Claire. I’m 31. I live alone in a third-floor apartment in Portland, Maine. I don’t smoke, don’t drink, don’t mess around with anything weird. I’m a project manager for a remote tech start-up, which means I’m usually on my phone before sunrise.

That’s probably the only reason I noticed it—the first voicemail.

It was last Monday.

6:16 AM.

Exactly.

Not 6:15.

Not 6:17.

6:16.

My phone buzzed, and there it was: "1 new voicemail – no caller ID."

I expected it to be spam. Or maybe one of those weird pre-recorded insurance scams.

But the moment I hit play, my blood went cold.

Voicemail #1 [6:16 AM]:

 “Claire, listen to me—don’t go into the parking garage. Not today. Just—take the stairs, go the other way, I don’t care. Don’t go down there. Please. You need to trust me.”

 “He’s there. He’s already there. And you can’t stop him this time.”

[Message ends.]

I didn’t move for a solid minute.

I replayed it five times.

It wasn’t just similar—it was me. Same cadence. Same weird throat-clearing tic I do when I get nervous.

But I hadn’t recorded that. I hadn’t called myself. And the timestamp on the voicemail was thirty seconds before it showed up.

That’s when the pounding started—my heart, I mean. That deep, ancient kind of fear you don’t feel as an adult unless you’re about to crash or get mugged.

I called the number back. It rang twice, then disconnected.

I opened my call log: nothing there.

Just the voicemail.

No number. No source.

Just a message from me.

I didn’t go to the parking garage that day.

I walked to a coffee shop and sat there for two hours, staring at my phone like it might start bleeding.

When I finally got the courage to go home, I checked the voicemail again.

Gone.

Deleted.

I hadn’t touched it.

 “Claire… it’s starting. I saw it last night. You were sleeping. You left the window open.”

“It watched you for hours. Please. Don’t sleep in your bed tonight. It likes your bed. It likes how still you are.”
 
 “God, I can’t breathe. It knows I know. You have to move. Don’t go to sleep at home. Do you hear me?”
 
 “You’re not safe—”

[Message ends.]

This time I screamed.

I was in bed.

My window was open.

And it wasn’t even cold outside.

I checked every lock, every closet, every inch of that tiny apartment with a kitchen knife in one hand and my phone in the other. Nothing.

But the smell…

There was a smell.

Like old water.

Rusty and wet.

The kind of smell you get in an underground parking garage.

That was a week ago.

And the messages haven’t stopped.

Every morning at 6:16.

Always from me.

Always worse than the last.

By the third day, I stopped calling people.

I tried my mom on Monday. I thought maybe she’d talk me down. Maybe she’d say it was all stress, hallucinations from too much caffeine and not enough sleep. But the moment she picked up, I heard my voice over the line.

Not hers.

Mine.

Laughing.

Then a click.

She hasn’t returned my calls since.

 “Claire, the mirror in the hallway—don’t look at it. Don’t. It’s not a mirror anymore.”

“It’ll show you something you can’t forget. Something you were never meant to see.”

“I looked. And now it follows me. It follows me through reflections.”

 “There’s more than one version of us now.”

I didn’t even mean to check the mirror.

It’s habit.

You pass it, you glance.

But this time…

The reflection didn’t match.

It blinked first.

It smiled.

And I was frozen in place.

I watched it tilt its head slowly—like it was curious.

Like it was watching me.

Then it raised a finger and shushed me.

I backed away.

Left the apartment.

Didn’t go back all day.

When I finally came home after dark, I checked every mirror before entering.

Nothing moved.

But there was a note taped to the back of the hallway mirror.

My handwriting.

“He’s not coming for you, Claire. He’s already you.”

Underneath was a series of numbers.

Coordinates.

I traced them.

An abandoned rest stop 40 minutes west of town.

I didn't go.

But I couldn’t sleep either.

I turned every mirror in the apartment around.

Smashed the one in the bathroom.

But the TV screen still showed me when it was off.

Just for a second.

And I swear—

It blinked.

I’ve been sleeping in my closet.

Lights on.

Phone on record.

I’ve started playing the voicemails into a Google doc, just in case they delete themselves again.

Because now I think they’re being erased.

Not deleted.

Scrubbed.

I checked my phone’s deleted folder.

Nothing.

Like they were never there.

 “You ignored me, Claire. Now it’s in the apartment.”

“It’s under the bed right now.”

“Don’t look. Don’t run. Don’t speak.”

“It likes to pretend it’s part of the furniture first.”
 “If you hear your name behind you… it’s already inside your shadow.”

“I miss you.”

I didn’t cry until that message.

I just sat there, frozen, as the closet light flickered.

I didn’t check under the bed.

I couldn’t.

I still haven’t.

Friday morning, I woke up to blood on the floor.

A perfect circle beneath the TV stand.

No nosebleed. No cuts.

Just blood.

Like someone had been watching from that spot.

I cleaned it with shaking hands.

But my mop water turned black.

Like oil.

And I couldn’t stop smelling rust.

I started locking my bedroom door at night.

But around 2:00 AM, I heard it.

Knocking.

Not loud.

Polite.

Rhythmic.

And a voice.

Mine.

But calm.

“Claire. It’s me. You were right to be afraid.”

“But I’m here now.”

“You can open the door.”

“It’s safer if you do.”

I covered my ears.

And it whispered through the cracks.

“You’re making this worse.”

I packed a bag.

Didn’t even shower.

Just threw on jeans, a hoodie, and grabbed my charger, flashlight, and my backup phone. I had to leave. I didn’t know where to go—I just knew I had to get away from the mirrors, the windows, the floorboards that groaned when no one was walking.

But when I stepped into the hall…

My neighbor, Mr. Klein, was standing outside his door.

He never looks up when we pass.

But this time, he did.

He smiled.

And said:

“You’ve been talking to yourself a lot lately, Claire.”

“They say once you hear your own death, it never really lets go.”

Then he shut the door.

I got in my car and drove.

No direction.

Just… west.

Away from Portland.

I made it twenty minutes before my phone buzzed.

No caller ID. 6:16 AM.

I nearly threw it out the window.

But I didn’t.

I pulled over.

Hands shaking.

Hit play.

 “Claire—wherever you’re going, don’t get on the highway. You won’t come back.”

“They’re watching the exits. They know what you’re trying to do.”

“You saw too much. That’s why you’re not allowed out.”

 “This isn’t about saving you anymore.”

“It’s about keeping you in.”

I froze.

Looked at the next road sign:

I-95 SOUTH RAMP – 1 MILE

How could it know?

How could I know?

I turned around.

Started driving back toward town.

And that’s when I noticed:

I’d passed that gas station before.

And that diner.

And that same kid on a bike—same clothes, same route, same exact motion.

I’d been driving in a loop.

Ten miles wide.

Endless.

There was no way out.

I parked in front of an abandoned hardware store on the edge of town.

Tried to breathe.

Tried to figure out what to do.

That’s when I saw the man in the yellow parka.

Just standing.

Across the street.

Staring directly at me.

No movement.

No expression.

Just stillness.

Until I blinked.

And he was gone.

But on the hood of my car…

Was a burned CD.

No label.

Just marker:

“You Saw It Too.”

I drove to a motel.

I don’t know why I trusted the CD. I just did.

I played it on the motel TV.

The video was grainy. Distorted.

Security footage.

It showed a room—my room—from above.

I was sleeping.

Tossing.

Whimpering.

Then I sat up.

Wide awake.

Only my face was wrong.

Too long.

Too still.

Eyes open. Staring.

Then I got out of bed…

And another Claire was still lying there.

I screamed.

Threw the TV remote through the screen.

Fell to the floor and sobbed.

Not because I was scared.

But because I was starting to realize:

There’s more than one of me.

Maybe there always was.

And the voicemails?

They weren’t from a future version.

They weren’t from the past.

They were from the ones that didn’t get out.

The ones that got trapped.

And now…

They want company.

I tried to leave again.

This time I didn’t even bother with a bag. I stole a truck from behind the motel—keys still in it, like it had been waiting for me. No phone. No GPS. Just instinct.

I passed the same billboard six times:

“You’re Closer Than You Think.”

Eventually, I pulled over and walked.

For hours.

Until I hit water.

A lake.

Still. Dark.

No ripples.

The moment I leaned over to look…

My reflection blinked.

And said:

“It’s not the town that’s the loop.”

“It’s you.”

I found it at a bus stop. One of those old-fashioned handheld cassette recorders with a sticky play button.

There was already a tape inside.

Labeled: “Try Again.”

I pressed play.

It was my voice.

But older.

Tired.

Resigned.

“You’ve tried 127 times. It always ends at 6:16. They always find you. You always loop back.”

“This version of you thought running would help. It didn’t.”

“Maybe this time, you’ll listen to me.”

“Burn it.”

“Burn the phone. Burn the mirrors. Burn the voice.”

“And maybe… just maybe… you’ll get to keep this version.”

I built one in the motel bathtub.

Fed it my phone.

My old voicemail backups.

The mirror from the medicine cabinet.

Even the motel Bible.

The flames went blue.

The walls breathed.

And then the phone rang.

Not the motel phone.

The one I burned.

Still glowing red in the ashes.

6:16 AM.

 “Claire… you almost made it.”

“But you waited too long.”

“Now there are too many of you.”

“And the one that’s real?”

“She stopped fighting.”

“I’m sorry.”

“This one ends the same way.”
 “Try again.”

I saw him outside the motel window.

Closer now.

Right at the door.

I didn’t open it.

He walked through it anyway.

Sat across from me.

Removed his hood.

And I saw me.

Not my face.

My whole body.

Like a wax replica grown wrong.

He smiled.

And whispered:

“Wake up.”

I woke up in my own bed.

Phone beside me.

Full battery.

Calendar said it was Sunday.

The air felt… clean. Too clean.

Like I’d been reset.

I didn’t trust it.

I opened my phone.

No messages.

No notifications.

But in the voicemail tab, there it was:

Voicemail from No Caller ID – 6:16 AM.

I didn’t press play.

I already knew what it said.

Because this time… it was my turn to record it.

I sat on the floor.

Pressed record on my own phone.

And spoke into the mic for the first time in days:

“Claire. If this is the next version of you… I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong. You just saw too much.”

“And now, we’re all watching you.”

“You have one shot. Burn the phone. Don’t answer. And for the love of God…”

“Never speak to yourself again.”

“The moment you do, it knows where you are.”

“Good luck.”

I saved the message.

Scheduled it to send.

6:16 AM tomorrow.

At exactly 3:00 PM, I looked in the bathroom mirror.

She was there again.

But closer.

Our movements synced now.

She smiled.

I didn’t.

She raised her hand.

I reached for the light switch.

She whispered:

“You’ve bought yourself time.”

“But time isn’t escape.”

“Time just means… we can find you again later.”

She faded.

I left Portland that night.

The buildings were wrong anyway.

Too clean.

Too symmetrical.

No traffic.

No birds.

Like the entire place had been rebuilt around me.

A box.

A loop.

A stage.

And now that I’d refused the final voicemail… it was collapsing.

I drove until the sun broke through like it hadn’t in days.

I live in a new place now.

Off-grid.

No mirrors.

No phone.

But every now and then, in the woods, I find burned CDs.

Unlabelled.

I never play them.

And I always bury them far from the house.

But last week…

One was sitting on my pillow.

No burn mark.

No scratches.

Just the number written on it in permanent marker:

“Claire_6_17”

So, if you’re hearing this—really hearing this—I don’t know which version of me made it out.

Maybe none of us do.

But if you ever get a voicemail from yourself…

Don’t listen.

Because once you do?

You’re already inside the loop.